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255 grams per week. That's the short answer to how much meat you can eat without harming the planet. And that only applies to poultry and pork.

Beef cannot be eaten in meaningful quantities without exceeding planetary boundaries, according to an article published by a group of DTU researchers in the journal Nature Food. So says Caroline H. Gebara, postdoc at DTU Sustain and lead author of the study."

Our calculations show that even moderate amounts of red meat in one's diet are incompatible with what the planet can regenerate of resources based on the environmental factors we looked at in the study. However, there are many other diets—including ones with meat—that are both healthy and sustainable," she says.

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[-] BeMoreCareful@lemmy.world 1 points 6 days ago

Dry ass nasty chicken breast. I'd rather some veggies, but it this allows BP to keep pumping oil into the Gulf then I guess it's fine.

[-] Zoomboingding@lemmy.world -1 points 1 week ago

Let's be honest about how unrealistic it is to expect people to voluntarily adhere to this. We need large scale lab meat asap

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[-] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 82 points 1 week ago

I don't like these kinds of articles because they always have an undertone of making it a matter of personal consumer choice as opposed to systemic change.

[-] chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world 22 points 1 week ago

Systemic change doesn’t happen without political will. Political will depends on personal opinions. Try to bring in systemic change with an election win but not overwhelming support then you get reactionary backlash like we’re seeing right now.

[-] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 week ago

Which is why I think it's better to start with some kind of populist attack on the excesses of the super rich. How many beef burgers was Katy Perry's publicity stunt in low orbit?

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[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 18 points 1 week ago

WRI published an interesting article on this subject a week or so ago:

https://www.wri.org/insights/climate-impact-behavior-shifts

Systemic pressure [e.g. voting / collective action] creates enabling conditions, but individuals need to complete the loop with our daily choices. It's a two-way street — bike lanes need cyclists, plant-based options need people to consume them. When we adopt these behaviors, we send critical market signals that businesses and governments respond to with more investment.

WRI's research quantifies the individual actions that matter most. While people worldwide tend to vastly overestimate the impact of some highly visible activities, such as recycling, our analysis reveals four significant changes that deliver meaningful emissions reductions.

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[-] RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works 12 points 1 week ago

If we simply stopped subsidizing meat consumption entirely the rising cost would shift more people to plant based diets.

[-] intelisense@lemm.ee 7 points 1 week ago

Nope, the government would get replaced at the next election, though.

[-] JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago

But it has to be both if only because somebody has to show the way. Governments are not going to clamp down on meat ag when the whole electorate is cheerfully eating meat.

Personally I see the argument "I can't do anything, it's about the system!" as a extremely convenient cop-out. Any system is made up of individuals.

[-] TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee 4 points 1 week ago

Personally I see the argument "I can't do anything, it's about the system!" as a extremely convenient cop-out. Any system is made up of individuals.

I think it's a bit more nuanced than that. If you look at the history of regulating substances or practices deemed harmful to the public, it's almost always led by governmental oversight. We knew asbestos was harmful way before it was regulated, but that didn't stop corporations from utilizing it in everything.

The whole point of federal governments is to moderate corporations at the systemic level. Corporations know they can win the fight against individual responsibility, but they're terrified of regulation.

We've already done this with the environment once before. The creation of the EPA popularized the push for clean air and water at a national level. Prior to the regulatory action there were of course people worried about pollution, but nothing really came of it until there was a regulatory body put in place.

[-] JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world -1 points 6 days ago

Yes yes, I understand all that. It remains that people are using the systems argument as an excuse not to change their own lives. I've seen this in action and so have you. No democratic system is going to change when citizens are not lifting a finger individually.

There's a legitimate argument to be had about the hypothesis where voters continue not to lift a finger but vote for green parties that promise to force them to. But that scenario seems to me too absurdly hypocritical and schizophrenic to be worth considering.

Of course it's necessary to change the system, but that's never going to happen until a critical mass of individuals put their actions where their mouths are.

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[-] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 week ago

And all ills in the current world are the result of a very small set of people. A small group of people has been pushing meat eating like crazy.a small set of people placed tiny taxes on meat.

A tiny percent of people are the reason why shipping is so big and so polluting. I can't change that, nobody can change that, except a tiny amount of people.

A tiny percentage of people are the reason why we have such differences in wealth in society.

It's a tiny amount of people that are the push behind all wars

I could go on for a while but blaming the common people for the world's ills is disingenuous from my perspective.

You want everyone to eat less meat? Start taxing meat properly. That requires politicians to do their jobs: make decisions that will make the world better for everyone, instead of making decisions that will make him or her get elected again.

Most politicians are lazy and or think people are stupid. People would understand meat being more expensive if explanations of why would be clearly posted everywhere and alternatives would become cheaper and more abundant.

Then again, we now live in a world where all idiots have a bigger megaphone than any scientist ever had. That too should change. I'm aorry, fuck your free speech, not everybody should be allowed to have a megaphone and talk about stuff, but that is a slightly different subject. Either way, that too could be solved by a tibt sliver of people

[-] JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world 0 points 6 days ago

The gulf between your worldview and mine is so wide as to make a productive discussion impossible. Unfortunately.

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[-] 9tr6gyp3@lemmy.world 45 points 1 week ago

Oh boy, the red meaters are going to downvote the shit out of this.

[-] reddig33@lemmy.world 41 points 1 week ago

Meh. I wouldn’t eat chicken these days either. You should see how it’s made. Corporate farming is abhorrent.

[-] tissek@sopuli.xyz 11 points 1 week ago

I'm kinda in this camp as well. Barely eat any meat and the meat I do buy is from small local producers where I can meet (hihi) and greet the animals.

[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 week ago

How does that work? Do you never eat meat when you go out?

There aren't a ton of places in the world with a good supply of vegetarian/vegan food AND enough of an ag industry you can go around petting your meat.

[-] GissaMittJobb@lemmy.ml 10 points 1 week ago

A majority of restaurants where I live offer at least one vegetarian option on their menu, and commonly also a vegan option (they might be the same)

[-] tissek@sopuli.xyz 7 points 1 week ago

Going out I have lots of vegan options so that isn't an issue generally. And am not rigid in my principles, being a bit moderate makes me less of an obnoxious cunt. Easier to cook for, take along on outings etc.

If I hold hard on any principle it is that to not let perfect stand in the way of good. Being able to do 90% ethical consumption I find to be much better than failing to be 100% pure.

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[-] Franklin@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

i literally only have meat on special occasions because of this, the entire meat industry is horrible for animals, for your health (red meat) and for the environment.

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Those of us in the USA should be asking if we think meat will be safe now that many regulations have been removed.

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[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 week ago

They've gotta check with best friend's cousins former roommate who runs a "sustainable" slaughter house where they "exclusively" (once a year) source their meat.

[-] JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world 16 points 1 week ago

This has been my rule of thumb for a while. It should be clear as day that 9 billion people cannot all chow on hefty ruminant mammals. We would run out of land even before it cooked the climate.

The problem with chicken farming is the cruelty.

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[-] HappySkullsplitter@lemmy.world 13 points 1 week ago

Well, beef is already so damn expensive that I can't remember the last time we bought it.

Meat-wise It's just been a steady cycle of chicken, turkey, and pork at our house

I had no idea we were so environmentally avant-garde

[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 week ago

Good on you!

When my wife and I started being conscious about our food intake, it wasn't too bad to give up red meat, and shrink meat portions / add veggies.

It took us months of learning / trying new recipes to actually get to the point where we were consistently eating fewer than 14 meat-centric meals a week (lunch/dinner). Once we got comfortable cooking plant based dishes though, we had built up so much momentum that we went from 1 or 2 plant based meals a week to 100% in just a few weeks.

It takes a long time to build up that comfort level, but at some point a switch just flips and the new "normal" is just as easy as what you were used to.

[-] federalreverse@feddit.org 7 points 1 week ago

You're not avantgarde. Veganism is a thing.

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Has any society in human history been able to afford eating meat regularly? My great great great great grandfather’s journals talk about a lot of stew and veggies and he was wealthy enough that he founded a small city. We never ate that much meat.

[-] jerkface@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Typically we don't need to eat meat when we are wealthy; we eat unsustainable meat when there is a famine because we must.

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[-] Archangel1313@lemm.ee 6 points 1 week ago

Can we please get moving on the lab grown meats already. This shit is getting depressing.

[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 20 points 1 week ago

Vegetables aren't so scary, are they?

[-] undefined@lemmy.hogru.ch 18 points 1 week ago

Being vegan now for 6+ years seeing articles and comments about meat is dystopian as fuck. It only took me a week to go from full-blown carnivore to vegan so people struggling with this always gets me.

[-] Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 week ago

Everyone is different. I was never vegan, rather considered myself plant based because I allowed both local eggs and local honey in my diet (still do) but no other animal products. Did this for many years until a coworker made a lunch of local hunted venison for a staff meal, and well, I'm mostly against the industrial farming practices, this was technically ethical hunting. This man was part of our local indigenous tribe, so I indulged as not to be rude. It was a great meal honestly. Everyone gawked I was eating meat. And I spoke often about the industrial process of meat farming to try and educate, but ultimately if these people wanted to feed their kids cheetos wrapped in bacon for breakfast, nothing I could say would change that, and its not my place to chastize.

I never understood those who chastized others for trying.

Vegans hated me because I like using local honey in spring to help with my hay fever. Which I have right now :( Nevermind I haven't had beef in years, I eat eggs from pet hens so a vegan gonna scream at me online. Yay. That will motivate me.. sure thing.

The method of education isn't going to work, and culture tied to meat cooking is so strong. Personally, giving up cheese, tbh, was really hard. Hummus wraps were the only thing that worked for me to satiate that urge for cheese. Vegan cheeses isnt it, idk why hummus wraps worked for me but it was much harder to give up cheese than butter or meat. I had to put a lot of effort to not cave to that kind of dairy at first. And im sure others have their own hang ups as well, it can be difficult, like quitting a vice.

Cultural change is slow (historically).

To note, After a number of years, a vegan friend of mine stopped being vegan. I think he was depressed, idk, but- we went to Wendy's. I wasnt going to get anything, but he prodded, and I fucking caved to a pub burger with bacon on a pretzel roll and.. my mouth had an orgasm, I swear to god. I got three more that week, realized they really do engineer this stuff to be so addictive. I questioned myself, what thefuck was doing? I had to stop this, and cut the behavior out just as fast, only because I could identify what was happening. Not everyone can.

Idk my point other than everyones journey will be different, but shaming folks isnt the ticket to healier environmental impacts always. Like I said, certsin vegans have shamed me for still consuming eggs and honey like it wasnt hard for me to give up cheese. Like telling an alcoholic they still suck because they drink soda. Its defeating.

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[-] tiredofsametab@fedia.io 6 points 1 week ago

I've moved to eating more non-meat than meat and skipping beef at home when I do, but I have never been able to fully convert. I was a pescatarian for almost 1.5 years in my youth and that was mostly doable, but still very tough and never really got easier.

A number of the existing alternatives involve gluten which I can't have anymore (I rather liked seitan when I had it).

I currently have a vegetable farm and, for as much of the year as I can, eat what I grow outside for veg so they're certainly not scary.

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[-] ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

We really don't need lab grown stuff when the meat alternatives on the market now are already so good

If you haven't tried any yet, I highly recommend Impossible meat, it's virtually indistinguishable from the real thing. Quorn is another great option.

And on a budget, Seitan is also fantastic.

[-] Zizzy@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 1 week ago

I have to disagree with this. Personally, I think every chicken alternative I have tried has been bad, and more expensive. I certainly havent tried everything, but I try what I see readily available to me.

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[-] sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 4 points 1 week ago

What about people that don't eat pork?

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this post was submitted on 23 Apr 2025
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